The results of the general elections held on Sunday force the main parties of both blocks (PP, Vox, PSOE and Sumar) to seek alliances to achieve an investiture. In this sense, the party led by Sumar has opened negotiations with Junts, which with seven deputies may have the key to the blockade, to try to reach an agreement and revalidate the coalition government.
With this purpose, Sumar has asked Jaume Asens, former deputy of En Comú Podem, to lead the conversations with the Catalan formations. Yolanda Díaz’s party believes that Asens “has shown in the past his ability to agree” and that with “his knowledge of him” of Catalan politics “it will be easier to reach an agreement.” For Sumar, “it is a luxury” to have him to “explore all avenues of agreement.”
Sumar has explained that the result “forces” them to negotiate with “responsibility, respect for the results and mutual recognition between parties.” In addition, the Díaz formation believes that they are “in the best position to lead the negotiations” with all the formations called to understand each other to “articulate a government for the social and plurinational majority” of the country.
Sumar obtained 31 seats last Sunday (12.3% of the votes), which added to those of the PSOE (122) remain 23 deputies short of the majority. With the support of those formations that already gave their vote to the coalition government, they would not have a sufficient majority either, leaving four deputies to achieve it. In this context, Junts, with seven deputies, appears as a key element for a possible investiture of Pedro Sánchez.
The good understanding between Junts and Jaume Asens has been demonstrated in the past. When the former deputy of the commons decided not to stand in the general elections of 23-J, the general secretary of Junts, Jordi Turull, thanked “the sensitivity and support” he received from Asens during the time that Turull was in prison, and the latter replied that in addition to “affectionately preserving the memory of our conversations in prison”, “we will always have the fight against repression in common”.